Thursday, May 31, 2012

Had a little hobby time and painted up the Berzerkers! Khorne be... Er... I mean The Emperor be praised! After building and painting a bunch of smaller, solo models it was a bit of a chore to batch paint a mess of infantry. On the up side, it's nice to be able to fill in a bunch of squares on the painting chart in green!

In the Tempus Fugitives list the Berzerkers are purchased as a unit of 8, with the option to add a further 8 models to the unit for a total of 16. I was pleased to note that the Fantasy Chaos Marauders box set is also a unit of 16, so I had enough bare arms to kit out the entire unit (though there are occasional power armoured arms here and there). Coupled with the more mutated shoulder pad from GW and a mix of bare heads and torsos they really take on a wild, murderous air. Perfect!

I did allow for the unit to be broken up into two 8 man squads via the helmeted and non-helmeted heads. which helps distinguish them on the table top. The champion was given a cloak from the Marauders sprue and I also went with a double-handed grip on the chain-axe. The axe blades were given a bit of blood spatter, and the boots were given a bit of a going over with some mud wash. I think overall I'm going to keep the blood spatter to a minimum - I may go back and add a bit more on the 'Zerks, but the regular troops will only have about this much. My intent with the army is to do the 7th Regiment, which I see as more adherent to the more restrained ways of the War Hounds (though this unit shows the influence of Khorne is nevertheless gaining a foothold).

I had a rummage around in the "Heads" bin and used a mish-mash of heads from several different kits. There's a couple of somewhat scary and mutated heads as a bit of a nod to the warping influence of Chaos taking root in the unit. After looking over the pictures in their far-larger-than-life size, there are definitely some places that I need to go in and clean up. Isn't that always the way? I think there's a bit more weathering to do before I'm totally satisfied, and the recesses of the whites could stand a bit more depth. I'm also finding that not only is white tricky to paint, but it's also tricky to photograph!

The army is coming along at a decent clip overall - Next up on deck are the first squad of Terminators and Bale. Since they'll all have roughly the same paint scheme and are stylistically similar with their scalloped shoulder pads, it makes sense to do them all at the same time! 6 models will be a nice change from 16!

Monday, May 28, 2012

As the packages trickle in from various sources, I'm finally able to build more and more of the army. Recently, the PuppetsWar arms I'd ordered arrived, and I set to building!

First up was the model for Bale, a character Dreadnought from the Tempus Fugitives list - Armed with a pair of DCCWs and heavy flamers, he also had Fleet, Rage and Furious Charge to make him just that extra bit more terrifying. I was quite pleased with the PuppetsWar arms, as they have the scalloped shoulder pads which help tie him in with the Terminators for the Heresy-era look, and were very posable, to give the model a really dynamic look.

From the description in the TF Age of the Emperor expansion: "A veteran of the Unification Wars and Commander of the XII Legion before the coming of Angron, Bale was mortally wounded in the World Eaters forlorn hope on Ariggata. Angron commanded his loyal First Captain be installed in a Dreadnought so he could continue to fight at his Primarch’s side. The near death state combined with the psycho-surgery he had received at Angron’s hand resulted in an insatiable bloodlust in Bale. This burning hunger sees him collecting skulls and having the Legion artificers attach them to his sarcophagus in tribute. Who this tribute is for, Bale will not say, but it is presumably to his Primarch – for who else would appreciate such a display?"

While I was about it I also built the rest of the first squad of Terminators to match the test model and got started with the painting process. At this point I very firmly packed up all the bits for the World Eaters into a box and stored it in the Closet of Doom. I have a tendency to build an entire army and then become disheartened by the mass of unpainted models. For this go-around I'm trying to adhere closer to the "build a unit, paint a unit" method. Between these two units, the Berzerkers and the Storm Eagle I have more than enough to paint for the near term!

Sunday, May 27, 2012

My hobby nostalgia got the better of me during the Kickstarter campaign to resurrect OGRE, and I picked up a few boxes of the miniatures they dragged out of the depths of Warehouse 23. Yesterday a few of the gaming group came by my place to teach one of them how to play 40k, and while one of the games was going on I painted these up. The intention was to paint up a set of minis sufficient to run the basic scenarios when the game (eventually) ships - a whole bushel of PanEuropean Alliance armor, and the North American Combine's Ogre Mk.IIIb.

I decided to start off with the basics, which includes the armies and their paint schemes. The PanEuropean Alliance is blue, while the North American Combine is red. I added some dirty white stripes for unit identification and to give them a little more visual pop, and went with a yellow spot color there and there. From primer to completion all this took about an hour and a half. A real nice change of pace from painting 40k!

The mainstay of the PanEuropean force are the swift and nimble GEVs (ground effect vehicles). They are able to make hit and run attacks where they dart in, make an attack, then arrow off out of their opponent's weapon range (hopefully).

The PanEuropeans also draw on vast armored regiments, ranging from the light scout tanks to front line heavy tanks.

Though nowhere near as formidable as the Combine's Ogres, the PanEuropean super heavy tanks are rightly feared. The missile tank, though lightly armored, packs a devastating punch.

The final line of defense is held by the mighty howitzers, lighter guns capable of being mounted on heavy crawlers gives them maneuverability at the cost of power, while the static emplacements are among the strongest weapons in the game.

Aside, of course, from the OGRE! This is a Mk.IIIb, one of the more common and extremely deadly variants to be found on the battlefields of The Last War. It's not all radioactive ash deserts however, and the Ogre occasionally feels the need to a swim (I loved that they include a 'swimming' Ogre model in the kit).

All right - got all that out of my system, the models will now get packed away in the Closet of Doom until November when OGRE ships. That's gonna be a bit of a wait...

Friday, May 25, 2012

The Forge World order I'd made over a month ago finally showed up last week, and I immersed myself in a frenzy of clipping, washing, rinsing, and straightening resin over the course of several evenings. Eventually I managed to get a few things built and primered, though nothing's fully completed as yet. Nevertheless, thought some pics in process might be in order!

First up on the building queue was the Storm Eagle. I was always lukewarm on the Storm Raven kit, it wasn't bad, but it wasn't really good either. The Chapterhouse extension kit was a step in the right direction, but the FW Storm Eagle kit really knocked it out of the park. My only minor niggle was the puny tail fin, so I bodged together a version of the "T" shaped tail boom which I think helps tie it in with the aesthetic of the Thunderhawk and the Storm Raven (and the new SM flier as well). This kit was a right pain in the butt to assemble - many of the panels were extremely bent and required a serious amount of time with hot water to try and wrench the pieces into some semblance of straight. After that there was a significant amount of clamping/banding/holding to get everything together. I love how it looks now that it's built, but I'm in no rush to build another one, that's for sure!

Of course, the Storm Eagle needs a unit to ride around inside it, and in this case it's a whole mess of frothing lunatics! A 16-strong squad of Berzerkers, to be precise. These are made from a mix of fantasy Chaos Marauders, the metal World Eater shoulder pads from GW, and Forge World Mk.V marine armour and Chainaxes. The intent was to make them look far more wild and deranged than the standard tactical and assault marines while still tying in with the rest of the army, which I think worked out pretty well. Still a long way to go on these of course, at the moment I'm just blocking in the main colors. Lots of highlighting, weathering and whatnot still to go...

Friday, May 11, 2012

So the next couple models were actually painted last week, but the machine spirit my pict upload codifier was displeased and needed to be placated. In a bid to continue with the 1-kill-point-a-week painting challenge that Dark Future Games is putting on, I painted up the pair of Chaplains for the World Eaters:

The first one will be joining a 16-strong unit of Berzerkers in a Storm Eagle - his Litanies of Hate will come in handy when they wade in swinging their chainaxes! The other is designed to accompany the Assault Squads - in the Tempus Fugitives lists the Assault units may be 10-man squads with jump packs, or alternately one big 20-man squad on foot, so I magnetized the backpack to allow him to use the standard pack, or utilize a jump pack as the situation dictates.

The plan is to use the GW world eater shoulder pad on the Berzerkers, so Chaplain Rennan wears one as well to tie him in with the unit. He also got a bionic arm from the Forge World upgrade it, and both of them are armed with the heresy-era bolt pistols.

Interesting side note - I'm literally down to the last two models still to paint in the army as it
stands. Almost 100% finished! Granted, the model count in the army at the moment is twelve, so
it's not like that's any sort of impressive accomplishment. Hah! Still waiting on the Forge World order from nearly three weeks ago for the lion's share of the bits required to actually BUILD any of the rest of the army. On the plus side, the order from DragonForge arrived, so now there are bases galore!

Thursday, May 10, 2012

I try my best to keep this blog 40k-themed, but thought that this little deviation would be appropriate as it ties into how I got into the hobby in the first place...

Steve Jackson Games has a Kickstarter campaign going to release the 6th "Designers" Edition of his game from 35 years ago called OGRE. There was a resurgence in the mid-80's when I was in middle school, and it was there that I was first introduced to the nuclear wastelands of the Last War. My science teacher ran the school's Games Club (which ran the gamut from cards to chess to RPGs to minatures) and had several copies of the miniature based "Deluxe OGRE", which was my first introduction to miniature wargaming around '84 or so (several years prior to the release of the 1st edition 40k). I must have played hundreds of games of OGRE, GEV and Shockwave (the two expansions) during the mid 80's, though once 40k got its hooks into me I more or less jumped ship over to the grim darkness.

However, that old game still lurks in my hindbrain, kept alive by occasional re-reading of Kieth Laumer's Bolo books and it was a foregone conclusion that I'd be a backer for a project to bring OGRE back to life. And what a life it's returning to! It's gone from the original pocket box game (about the size of a DVD case today) to its new incarnation as a 15 pound, 21"x18"x5" monster... Only fitting for a game that has some of the biggest, baddest armored units ever to take to the battlefield! In addition, they have dug up a bunch of backstock of the old OGRE miniatures and made them available for sale on Warehouse 23, and I'm not ashamed to say that I jumped in and bought a mess of minis in anticipation of the release of the game! It'll be interesting to paint up some 1/256th scale minis after about 20 years of 28mm. Alas not every model that was made is still available, but I did pick up a couple OGRE Mk.IIIb's and a selection of the Paneuropean models sufficient to run the standard missions in miniature format....

The Kickstarter campaign ends (as of this writing) in about 26 hours. I heartily recommend at least giving it a look - the game is an absolute blast! For $100 you get a tremendous amount of game - due to the stretch goals being absolutely CRUSHED by the supporters (they are at $730k of an original $20k goal) they've added all sorts of extras to what you get in the box. Not only that, but the success of this project has convinced them to bring back Car Wars in 2013, which I am absolutely delighted to hear!

Anyway - chances are there will be another small diversion when the minis I'd ordered show up, but for now we return you to our regularly scheduled 40k programming...

Wednesday, May 9, 2012

Not a whole lot of hobby time of late, coupled with the fact that my Forge World order is going into its second week of delay, means that I've not had much progress. I did, however, manage to build the first test model for the first of two terminator squads:

The models are a smorgasbord of companies! The upper torsos were picked up on eBay from irina_est, who also made the torsos on one of the terminator squads in my Thousand Sons army. The massive chainaxe is built from a thunder hammer from the assault terminator sprue and a Forge World chainaxe. The combi-melta comes from Chapterhouse, while the arm holding it is the one that ordinarily carries a storm shield. The replacement fist to fill in for the lack of storm shield comes from the Grey Knight terminator kit, and I was happy to find some super cheap on ebay. The legs are also from the assault terminator box, being careful to only use the ones with full greaves (as opposed to the ones with a separate knee pad) as it's more befitting the era. In addition each of the left greaves will be receiving .050" rivets courtesy of Tichy Train group. Phew!

There will be 5 terminators in this unit, and they will be in the standard white and blue of the World Eaters legion. The intention is to also do a 7-strong unit of terminator-armored Primarch Honor Guard (known as The Devourers) who will be in red and gold to match their Primarch.

...Of course, I ran out of 40mm bases and had to scavenge one to build this model, so I'm in a bit of a holding pattern on that front. Argh!

Tuesday, May 8, 2012

So the general consensus has seemed to be that, while they are interesting and have their uses, the new GW washes aren't direct analogs to the ones they are replacing. That concerned me as I utilize both the badab black and devlan mud washes heavily in my World Eaters paint scheme. A thread on the Dakka Dakka forums led me to believe that the Army Painter Warpaints range had an ink line that might suit my needs. I ordered up a few bottles of each and a few days later they arrived. I grabbed a model off the shelf and set to giving the base a bit of the old GW washes and a hit of the new Army Painter versions:

I started off with the old favorite Devan Mud and the upstart Strong Tone. I painted one right after the other with as close to the same application as I could. Just a single pass and a light sweep. Have to say, they're pretty darn close!

What is less close is the amount you get in the bottle. $3.70 gets you 12ml of the GW wash, where you get 18ml for $3.25 (or cheaper, depending on where you order from). 50% more ink for 10% less money sounds like a deal to me!

Eagerly, I grabbed the other bottle of Dark Tone and gave it a run up against the Badab Black. Again, darn near a photo finish. If I hadn't labeled them, I probably wouldn't be able to tell you which was which.

I have to say I'm not a huge fan of the dropper style bottle for inks in particular (love them for regular paints, though). I need to get the hang of how much to drip out, as I'm finding more is drying in the inkwell than on the model...

In any case, I'm sold on these two inks and I honestly wish I'd found out about them sooner!

Thursday, May 3, 2012

The folks over at Dark Future Games are running a weekly painting challenge that I thought I'd get in on - the idea is to paint up one Kill Point a week, which should hopefully keep me on task for the Heresy Era World Eaters I'm working on. My entry for this week is a pair of Drop Pods:

I'd originally build these a while back based on OST's awesome pseudo-Dreadclaw that he built early last year. Originally planned for use with my Heresy-Era
Thousand Sons, the theme of the army didn't really support them so they just
languished on a shelf in the Closet of Doom. But no longer! Bunch of frothing
lunatics that the World Eaters are, they need a quick way to get to grips with
their opponents and what better way than a pair of Drop Pods?

I'm trying out some weathering techniques on this army,
which is something I've never done before - the intent on these was to show
that the paint was peeled back and blackened from their descent, coupled with
the idea that the claws would drive into the ground and lever the pod upright,
revealing the marines that have disembarked from underneath (hence why the
weathering on the 'legs' isn't all the way up to the level it is on the main
fuselage). Tried a bit of the 'heat bluing' techniques that Ron over at FTW hasdescribed, though with varying levels of success. I think it'll work great on
weapon barrels and small areas like that, but on the big flat planes of the
Drop Pods it was a bit of a hash. Overall, I'm fairly pleased with how they
turned out.

With them done, I'm really running out of things to paint! All the white boxes are in various stages of "waiting for packages to arrive" so there's nothing to build, and I can't afford to buy any of the grey boxes at the moment. That said, next week's entry in the painting challenge will be a pair of Chaplains (likely not
available in the upcoming Chaos Codex, but part of the Tempus Fugitives Age of
the Emperor lists) that I've built and primered. Should be fun!

About Me

I've been an avid follower of 40k since the original days of Rogue Trader. Back in 1988 I picked up my first copy of the rulebook and good old RTB01 - the box of plastic beaky space marines and the rest as they say is history. 20 years later I'm still playing with little army men... And enjoying every minute of it!